But can we say that people valuing their existence is rational? It mainly seems to be the product of a deeply ingrained survival instinct, and the fact that we erroneously project some sort of subjective state into nonexistence, even when we know there can't be any.
Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
I understand your point. There is no proven objective value to our lives. There is no logical way to prove such a thing objective. There is no conceivable way to even imagine how such a thing could be objective.
But does any of that matter? Logically and rationally I think it's better to accept reality and be happy enough that we have meaning subjectively.
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
One could say we were alive on a cellular level within our mother and fathers body, but it would not have been “us” until the moment of conception.
Does a sperm cell or egg cell have consciousness? If so, when a sperm cell enters the egg, is conscious somehow combined to form your “new” individual consciousness or is consciousness like water, were if you add one drop of water to another drop of water, all you have is more water, but no difference in it’s structural makeup?
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
If they do then all microbial life is conscious, which I personally think is the case, with provisos. What does one make of a consciousness exponentially smaller and weaker than our deep sleep state (being that of one cell in the sleeping body)? Are reflexes, which put together produce consciousness, consciousness in themselves or only components of consciousness.Present awareness wrote: ↑January 20th, 2019, 2:43 pmDoes a sperm cell or egg cell have consciousness?
Certainly the level of conscious awareness of embryos and even foetuses, is hugely less than that of intelligent mammals like cows or sheep. This would have consciousness break down into reflexes and chemical reactions, and then it all forms again - and the way it all forms will be different for having your remains in the mix, not to mention the marks one leaves during life.
The ideas of how to exist would seem to be eternal (or at least ugradeable) and each of us is a variant manifestation of those general ideas - how to be a chordate, a mammal, a simian, a human, how to be a powerful or weak human, unreactive or catalytic, outgoing or isolated, specialised or variant and so on. The latter qualities of entities in populations would seem to be universals that appear in all kind of populations, pretty well all of them hierarchic to some extent.
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
I personally believe that the universe has always been, including life and consciousness. The Big Bang theory tells us something major happened some 13.7 billion years ago, but cannot explain what was there before that. If one compares the birth of the universe with the birth of a child, there is a rapid expansion of cells (stars) resulting in billions of cells (galaxy’s) only in a much shorter time frame.
The Earth was like an egg in the womb of the solar system, being seeded with life frozen in comets and/or meteorites billions of years ago.
Once we realize that size does not exist, but is only relative to the subject that is doing the measuring, then we may zoom out until the entire known universe with all its galaxy’s, could fit into a grain of sand on the beach.
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
Yes, there is an egglike dynamic there. I am quite unsure that humanity has quite managed to get its head around our relationship with the Sun and how it comprises 99.8% of the solar system's mass. The star practically is the solar system, just with some debris orbiting that it (plus gravity) shapes into worlds over time, orbit by orbit as if a potter's wheel.Present awareness wrote: ↑January 22nd, 2019, 8:34 pmThe Earth was like an egg in the womb of the solar system, being seeded with life frozen in comets and/or meteorites billions of years ago.
Once we realize that size does not exist, but is only relative to the subject that is doing the measuring, then we may zoom out until the entire known universe with all its galaxy’s, could fit into a grain of sand on the beach.
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
Then again, if the Sun was not ever shining on your face ...Present awareness wrote: ↑January 23rd, 2019, 1:03 am Yes, we are all direct byproducts of the Sun’s light and warmth! It’s hard for me to get my head around the idea that something so massive as the Sun, is middle aged and still has billions of more years to burn before it runs out of fuel. The fact that stars are born and die, like other organic life forms, makes me appreciate all the more that I am here, in the prime of the Suns life, to share a brief moment of eternity and feel the Sun’s warmth on my face. I often wonder what will become of the specs of dust and rock we call planets, that once orbited the Sun, say in 20 billion years from now when the Sun is gone and all that remains is a dwarf star.
Encouragingly, the Sun is not the most suitable for intelligent life. It's said that orange dwarfs live far longer, 20 millions years or more, which allows more time for planetary development, but without the disadvantages of red dwarfs.
It's hard to know what the far future holds. In four billion years' time the Milky Way will collide with Andromeda and this will hurl many planets out of orbit (maybe ours too?). Meanwhile, in five billion years' time the Sun is due to expand into a red giant, reaching out as far as the Earth or maybe Mars. In a deus ex machina sci fi scenario, the galactic collision would push Earth's orbit exactly into the habitable zone as the Sun expanded and cooled, adding billions of years to its lifespan :)
Whatever, by then we'd need to be post-biological to survive, which means we need it to be possible for consciousness to exist in a non biological substrate.
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
Everyone wonders about what happens after death.Elgruaro wrote: ↑January 13th, 2019, 10:44 pm I've been reading about a theory from Dr. Bryan Ehlmann which supports a "natural afterlife." Basically, he suggests that if non-existence follows after death, then we will be forever locked in a state of experience comprising of our very last moment. He uses the following thought experiment:
"You’re totally engrossed in watching an extremely exhilarating movie. Then, without knowing, you unexpectedly, without any perceived drowsiness, fall asleep. For you the movie has been unknowingly paused, while in reality (that for others) it continues on. Until you wake up, you still believe you’re watching that movie."
He suggests that because we will never perceive any indication that our consciousness has ceased when we die, we will continue this final state of consciousness forever and that in this state, time will become infinite.
Some of my thoughts on the topic:
- There will no longer be a self to consciously experience this last moment, so how can it be that this moment will continue forever?
- How specific is this static moment? Is it an everlasting experience of the second before we die? A millisecond? This quickly becomes an irrational thing to discuss.
- What if we die in some horrible way and are suffering until our last moments? (e.g., burned alive, suffocation, etc.) If we take this theory seriously, then that provides some pretty daunting implications. An eternity of extreme pain locked into a single moment? Yikes.
Overall, I don't know what to think about the plausibility of this theory. It makes sense to me that without a transferred state to let me know that I am no longer conscious, then from my point of view, I won't know that my final moment of consciousness has ended. But as mentioned, how can consciousness exist without an entity to experience it?
What do you guys think?
Billions of people already have found out but they are not around to tell us.
Generally the topic is a matter for religions not for philosophy nor for science.
With Aristotle's and Aquinas' classic proofs of God we can prove philosophically that God exists and is immortal and unchangeable.
However only Descartes has empowered us to prove that we ourselves presently exist. Nothing about where we came from nor where we are going after this mortal life.
You just need to live with the uncertainty.
But it is reasonable to assume that whatever is the case for humans is also the case for animals as well. And possibly even for plants also.
Thanks to Catholic Christianity I have a hope of an eternal afterlife as an angel of God and I hope my cat is there with me too, as well as my rabbit and my 2 birds.
This is called faith. What follows is hope. In the meantime I am saddled with a responsibility for my fellow mankind and the animals and a requirement for good works until the day I die. Hope is not free. It carries a price tag.
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Re: Theory of Natural Eternal Consciousness
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